


Sympathy for the Devil

by Arlome



Series: Hell Hath No Fury [2]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Attempt at Humor, Crack, Demons, F/M, Hell, Post-Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-14
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-03-05 12:10:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18828424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arlome/pseuds/Arlome
Summary: Paimon is a busy demon.He's got a double shift at the Lake of Tormented Souls and a two-day seminar on torture via flamingos.Life would have been sweet if not for all the devilish moping.All in all, he just wants to help.Sequel to "Eat, Pray, Mope".Post-season 4!





	Sympathy for the Devil

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NotOneLine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotOneLine/gifts).



> Seriously, I blame NotOneLine....
> 
> This little crack fic was never supposed to go beyond a silly one-shot.
> 
> It is now a trilogy.
> 
> NotOneLine - thanks for the awesome beta read!
> 
> For the Lucifer Bingo prompt, "Accidental Hero",

Paimon has a busy week.

It starts off fairly sweet, with a two-day _‘Torture by Flamingos – Yay, or Nay’_ seminar in the lower Pit of Despair, run by Azazel the Inquisitor. Then, the week slowly leaks into a double shift at the Lake of Tormented Souls, and oozes into a three-day business trip to the Tyrant Wing, where he gets to practice his notorious speciality; fingernail pulling.

Yes, it’s a busy week, but Paimon’s not complaining; no, Sir. He knows an opportunity to rise in the underworld, so to speak, when he sees one, and – being the ambitious young demon that he is – he grasps it by its scrawny neck.

All goes according to plan until halfway through the week, the Boss decides to visit the Lake of Tormented Souls. He strolls down the path to the sandy beach, a large book under one arm and a folding chair under the other, looking like he’d rather be volunteering at a Children’s Hospital than be here.

“Don’t mind me,” he says as he folds his long form into the chair and creaks the dusty tome open, “I’m just catching some fire – don’t want to lose my LA tan, you see. It’d look weird if I returned pasty white and sickly.”

 _Oh, poor sod,_ Paimon thinks to himself, frowning in pity, _you actually think you’re getting back up there…sad._

“Sure thing, Boss,” he says instead - because he is a smart demon who likes his skin on his flesh as opposed to off it. “You just sit back and relax.”

A few minutes and pages later, the King of Hell begins to _sigh_ and Paimon rolls his eyes Heavenwards.

Right, this moping has _got_ to stop.

 

***

Paimon gets the idea from Dromos, of all demons.

He stalks the creature on his way to kitchens and ambushes him, bombarding him with questions.

“That human woman the King’s smitten with – has he bedded her?”

Dromos looks at him suspiciously and stirs a large cauldron with an iron spoon.

“How should I know?! Lucifer has blessed many filthy humans with his seed, why should this one be any different?”

“Because he’s moping, Dromos,” Paimon explains slowly, as if speaking to a slow-witted troll, “he’s _moping.”_

The older demon looks at him with disgruntled uncertainty and shrugs, stirring the reeking soup slowly.

“Yes, well,” he grumbles reluctantly, bringing the spoon to his lips; after a quick taste he adds some salt and crushed parsley, “he’s been up there too long; Hell knows what those grimy wildebeests did to him.”

They stand in awkward silence for a few minutes, Dromos ever stirring. Paimon eyes the soup with interest.

The younger demon is a cunning bastard, everybody says so; one of the smarter demons in Lucifer’s circle. He spends his free time reading books on Satanic lore and Heathen Mythology (and the occasional Bodice-Ripping novel, but who’s counting…) There are writings, there are legends. It’s not even that far fetched.

All the King needs in order to stop moping is a good, hard shag.

A plan begins to form and grow sinew and skin in his putrid, scheming mind.

“Say,” he turns to Dromos in fake cheer, “is this Matzah Ball soup? I could fetch Lucifer a bowl for you - if you’d like!”

 

****

Breaking into Lucifer’s safe isn’t easy, but Paimon manages to do it somehow, anyway.

Two Pentecostal coins lie gleaming in the palm of his hand as he makes his way towards the sheds. He finds some jars in a corner – probably the ones for the eyeballs that the King flew down a while ago – and pours the putrid soup into one. Theft achieved and jar acquired, he makes his stealthy way towards the gates.

The journey up is not pleasant, to say the least.

The minute he lands on the shore, he sways on his feet and vomits.

It’s night time, and there are no humans about. Typical. Now, how he’s going to find that woman?

He knows the wench’s name and her face, courtesy of one very tormented soul below – it’s funny what you can glean from a tortured mind when you tweak the loop this way and that. 

All he needs to do is find one of the vermin to guide him in the right direction.

A tall man walking his dog passes by and Paimon leaps at the opportunity.

“You! Human!” he growls at the meat-sack, scaring the poor dog into a stupor, “I need to find Detective Chloe Decker!”

The man looks like he may have just soiled his pants. He’s clutching at his chest, breathing erratically; his wild eyes taking the sulphur-reeking apparition and trying to write it off as a ‘too much fresh air’ induced hallucination.

“Well, quick!” the spectre barks and the poor man practically jumps two feet in the air. “I have little time here as it is!”

“Y-you m-might want t-to try a p-p-p-police station!” the human stutters and points a shaking finger in the direction of the city. “T-there!”

Paimon nods, grunts his thanks and loiters away, leaving the human to deal with his impending cardiac arrest on his own.

The Demon skulks and navigates through the streets easily. He’s seen enough hell loops in his lifetime that featured endless traffic jams and packed boulevards to know how to proceed. It takes stopping at three different precincts to finally find the one the woman works in; the sleepy receptionist yawns in his face.

“Detective Decker left two hours ago, but if you want to leave her a message or a package, that’s her table over there.”

Paimon lurches forward, stares at the weird, four-legged torture device and _grins._

It doesn’t matter that she’s not here; he’s caught her scent.

 

***

The woman that opens the door when he knocks is easy on the eyes.

Paimon has to hand it to the Boss, the Devil has good taste.

“Can I…help you?” she asks hesitantly, a little frown forming on her face. The demon goes as far as to bow.

With a flourish.

“I am called Paimon of the Lilim, Master of the Pit, Puller of Nails; I bear a message for Chloe Jane Decker from my King, The Morningstar.”

The woman’s eyes cloud over and her lips tremble for a full second before she bites them to make it stop.

“A message from Lucifer…?” she whispers, wetly, and moves aside to let him in, “Please, come inside!”

He recognizes the inside of the house from Cain’s loop; cold colours, warm light, a lot of crudely drawn pictures. The woman moves to the counter, her hands shaking.

“W-would you like a drink?” she asks, shrugging, “I have coconut water…?”

Paimon doesn’t understand the significance of the type of beverage, or the need to offer him refreshments, so he declines, and instead pulls the jar out of his armour pocket and places it on the cool surface.

The woman eyes the bubbling liquid with suspicion and trepidation.

“This is an ancient Hellish heartbreak remedy,” Paimon lies without batting an eyelash., “It’s from the Boss, to help you through your grief. Just a little sip should do.”

“And the clumps…floating inside it…?”

“Matzah Balls,” the demon intones and crosses his arms. “Are you going to drink this, or not? Only it’s bingo night at the Pit, and I promised my gran I’d take her; that bitch will flail me alive if I don’t.”

The detective frowns and cringes.

“Sorry – you said Lucifer had a message for me? Is – is this it?” she asks pointing at the jar in ill-concealed disdain.

Paimon rolls his eyes.

“The King sends his undying love, blah-blah-blah; now would you take a bloody sip already, so I can get back to Hell?”

“Right….” She says, gingerly uncorking the jar, “I guess one sip won’t hurt.”

She brings the offending soup to her lips, nearly gagging in the process, and drinks. Paimon holds his breath.

“Such an _unusual_ tas-“

He manages to catch her in his arms before she hits the ground.

 

***

 

“Well, Paimon,” Dromos announces in ill-restrained glee, his arms crossed over his chest in triumph, “you’ve only gone and done it! I hope you like your squishy bits on the outside, you sack of excrement; because that’s where they’re going to be when _He_ finds out what you’ve been up to!”

Paimon sniffs in fake nonchalance, effectively hiding the seeds of doubt and sprouts of fear blooming in his gut; the woman in his arms lies in a dead faint.

“And what exactly is it that I did, eh?” he counters, shrugging; the woman’s arms jerk with the motion. “He was moping. What kind of loyal subject would I be, if I allowed my King to suffer needlessly? Besides,” he adds in a smaller voice, “it’s not like she’s _dead;_ she’s just resting. I gave her some of your soup.”

Dromos throws his hands in the air.

“So that’s why Lucifer never said anything to me about that bowl of soup!” he sulks, muttering and grumbling. “It never got to him, you thieving bastard! And here I was, slaving away – _slaving,_ I say; when all this time – “

“Would you shut up about your rotting soup, you idiot!” Paimon growls at him. “The important bit is that Lucifer can stop moping now. One or two shags and he’ll be back to his devilish self, and _all_ can go back to normal!”

Dromos opens his mouth to speak, no doubt about to continue bitching and moaning about his toils in the kitchen, when an outraged bellow shakes Hell to its very core.

“Uh-oh,” the older demon mutters, nearly folding in half. “He probably sensed her soul; best of luck with keeping all your insides, pal.”

A gush of strong wind nearly brings Paimon and his charge to his knees. A minute later he’s being picked up by the throat, the woman still clutched tightly in his arms. Red eyes bear into his skull, the fire within them terrible to behold.

“Explain!” the Devil growls and Paimon squeaks. The woman in his arms stirs and groans.

 _Good timing, lady,_ the demon thinks as the hold on his neck slackens and Lucifer rushes to extract the human from his grip, _a little more pressure and I’d be dead!_

“Chloe; Chloe, darling!” the Devil mutters, cradling the semi-unconscious woman in his arms, before turning his murderous gaze on his subject. “You better start explaining yourself, Paimon, or so help me Dad, I’ll rip out your bollocks and use them as a purse!”

“Well, Sire,” the demon begins, rising unsteadily to his feet, “the important thing to remember is that your lady love is not dead, just taking her beauty sleep. I fed her some of Dromos’ soup, and –“

“You fed her something that was prepared in _Hell?”_ Lucifer bellows, and his hand, resting on the woman’s head, shakes in fury, “Do you have a death wish, you worthless piece of – “

“Lucifer…?”

All grows quiet. The doors stop rattling. The air stands still.

There’s a living soul in Hell, and it shines as bright as fire.

“Detective…” The Devil’s voice grows soft with emotion, Paimon and Dromos share a nauseated look.

“W-what happened?” the woman asks, sitting upright in Lucifer’s lap, “What is this place…?”

“Hell, peach,” Dromos pipes in unhelpfully. “Your glorious mortal ass is in Hell.”

The detective turns to their King with wide, terrified eyes.

“I _died?”_ she cries, tears spilling from her eyes, “and ended up in _Hell?_ But...but - Trix!”

“You’re not dead, Chloe,” Lucifer explains carefully, his arms holding her in place, “you’re quite alive. Paimon here,” he growls, fixing the demon with a scathing look that almost sends him running for the hills, “has done something _very_ naughty. Haven’t you, slime?”

“Now then, Sire,” Paimon says, getting defensive, “there’s no need for the name calling; not when your lovely lady here is alive and well. I merely made sure that she could come visit you and please you sexually so that you stopped moping around the place!”

“I wasn’t moping!” Lucifer splutters, the colour rising in his cheeks.

“Beg your pardon, my Liege,” Dromos argues, leaning in, “but you were moping something ‘orrid. Now, me and the lads didn’t want to say a thing, but it was really quite unbecoming. You being the Master of Damnation, and all. You’ve got a reputation to uphold, Sire.”

“Very true,” Paimon squeaks quietly.

“You were…moping?” the woman asks, her hands coming to frame the King’s face.

“Well….” he mutters, looking downwards, his voice trailing off.

“Something ‘orrid, missus,” Dromos repeats, shaking his head, “You should have seen him. Nothing helped! We tried baking him a cake, tried sprucing up the place a bit, you know – make it really homey, but nothing! Just mope, mope, mope! As if we didn’t matter – “

“Yes, alright!” Lucifer interjects, silencing the demon with a well-aimed look, “I think she got the picture!”

“I was miserable too, Lucifer,” the woman sighs, and the Devil closes his eyes. “This week was probably the worst – “

“A week?” Paimon interrupts her, rolling his eyes. “That’s nothing! We had to endure the moping for years!”

“Wait, what?”

Lucifer sighs and rises, helping the woman to her feet.

“Time moves differently here in Hell,” he explains, unable to look her in the face. “Up there I’ve only been gone for a few days, when actually I’ve been stuck here for decades, Detective.”

“So, I’ve been only gone for, what, a second?” she asks uncertainty, her fingers creeping back to his face. “Nobody will come looking for me? I can stay for a while – with you?”

“Don’t worry, missus,” Paimon interjects proudly, feeling his fate to be better than he initially thought it to be, “I took care of that. I left a note on your counter, saying that you’ve gone fishing!”

Lucifer groans.

 

***

 

Paimon can’t believe it, but the honeymoon period is worse than the moping.

He can’t go anywhere in this dreadful place without catching his King and his lover in a compromising position, doing something too naughty even for Hell to handle.

He catches them snogging in the shed on his way to pick up some hammers for torture chamber no’ 52; walks in on them sucking face like human teenagers in the kitchens. He even manages to stumble upon them doing something unspeakable on a beach towel near the Lake of Fire.

All in all, he can’t get away from the pair, no matter how hard he tries.

“I can’t stand it,” he confides in Dromos and Crucio in the cantina, on their lunch break. “It’s sickening! So many fluids exchanged and not a single torture tactic involved! It’s _unnatural.”_

Crucio takes a bite of a seasoned bone of a saint, crunching happily.

“You leave Him be, the boy is happy!” he mutters, mouth full. “I’d take Him, face deep between that woman’s thighs over Him moping on that throne of his, alone, any day!”

“Yes, He’s just blowing off steam,” Dromos agrees, drinking a bit of blood wine. “You just wait and see, He’ll get her out of his system, give her one of those Pentecostal coins, and send her on her merry way in _no_ time. Nothing to worry about. We’ll get our Devil back, happy and satiated.”

Paimon sighs, a sickening premonition of the future festering in his gut.

“I hope you’re right,” he says, quite unable to eat, “I hope I don’t live to regret hooking the Boss up with that chick.”

 

***

 

He lives to regret it. He lives to regret it _Big Time._

A few weeks after the woman arrives, she’s crowned Queen of Hell, in a lavish, pompous ceremony.

Dromos bakes a cake.

“How _could_ you?” Paimon asks, disgusted, “I thought you didn’t like her!”

Dromos shrugs, looking sheepish.

“I don’t,” he concedes. “She’s too… _nice._ But I like Him, and He’s happy. Look at Him – smiling like an angel…”

Paimon can swear he hears the older demon’s voice wavering.

“It’s not right,” Crucio mutters from his place next to them at the back of the crowd. “He should have taken one of our solid demon girls, given us the antichrist we deserve. I’m getting on in years, is finally getting a lovely, dark curly haired antichrist too much to ask? Hell knows I’ve done enough to deserve it!”

“Maybe it’s not so bad,” Dromos, ever the optimist, mutters as before him the Devil leans in to kiss his bride, “maybe they’ll file for divorce.”

Paimon doesn’t hold his breath.

 

***

 

A lazy afternoon at the Pit of Despair. Paimon and Dromos spend their downtime by playing a nice game of chess.

The painful moans of the wicked are low and pleasing and the air is surprisingly cool for the season. Dromos sighs contentedly and takes a sip from his beer.

“This is the life, old boy,” he says and moves his bishop, “torture, drink and chess. Nothing can beat that.”

A sudden, frightened scream pierces the air, followed by a startled shout and the tell-tale ‘whoosh’ of flying.

“What the fuck was that?” Paimon asks, not lifting his eyes off the game board.

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry,” Dromos drones, leaning back in his seat. “They’ve probably been shagging up there on the throne again, and the Queen slipped and fell.”

Paimon sighs dramatically and moves his King to evade some crafty manoeuvre from his playmate.

“So much for divorce,” he mutters.


End file.
